He arrives the day before the wedding, when everyone is in full-blown, breathe-into-a-paper-bag, gouge-my-eyes-out-just-so-I-can-look-at-something-other-than-a-seating-chart-or-gift-registry mode. The doorbell rings halfway through Mom and Bree’s fifth argument about the merits of a half-updo, and I gladly slip out of the kitchen. Our front door has been open nearly all the time for the past few weeks, constantly swinging open for deliveries and people and Heather the manic wedding planner. The one thing I have not been expecting to see on my front step is an almost freakishly tall boy with golden-tanned skin, dark brown hair, and acres of smooth muscles. We blink at each other for barely a second before he flashes me a grin so white and perfect that I can’t believe he’s not a spokesman for Crest. “Well, if you’re Travis, I think I finally understand this whole shitstorm,” he says in a honey-sweet Southern drawl. “I’d be willing to get myself disowned too, if it meant I’d get a chance to get my hands on you.” “Um,” is all I can say. I don’t think I have ever seen anyone so gorgeous in my entire life. I don’t think anyone so gorgeous has ever existed before. As he raises a duffel bag and steps past me, however, my brain finally starts again. “Who are you?” “I’m the emissary,” he says, laughing just a little at his own private joke. When I don’t laugh with him, he inclines his head a fraction of an inch. “My name’s James Goldwyn. I’m here on behalf of Garen.” “You’re here on what of whom?” Mom says loudly from the other room. She bursts from the kitchen with acid in her eyes, but the second she sees James, she freezes. Being in the presence of a god seems to have that effect on a lot of people. “I’m here on behalf of Garen,” James repeats. “He would have liked to attend the wedding himself, but given the circumstances, he felt it was inappropriate.” Bullshit. Like being appropriate was ever high on Garen’s list of virtues. “He asked me to come in his place.” Mom stiffens visibly, and Bree pokes her head around the corner. She looks from James, to me, to Mom, then ducks back around the corner, but not before I see her lips moving to form the words, “Oh shit.” “I don’t know what Garen told you, but he no longer has a place at this wedding. He forfeited that place when he molested his brother,” Mom says. James’ warm brown eyes harden, but his polite smile remains intact as he tugs a folded piece of paper from the back pocket of his body-hugging jeans. “With all due respect, ma’am, Garen has been living with me at my dorm room in New York, where he received an invitation to the wedding several weeks ago. So, while you may not believe he has any place at this wedding, Garen’s father apparently does. Furthermore, I feel compelled to point out to you that the legal age of consent in the state of Connecticut is sixteen, and if I understand the story correctly, your son was still a virgin up until shortly after his seventeenth birthday. This, coupled with the fact that Travis referred to Garen as his boyfriend for several months, leads me to believe that any and all sexual acts that occurred between them were completely consensual, which would mean that your use of the word ‘molested’ is, pardon my language, bullshit.” James lifts his duffel once more and turns to me. “Now, Garen has given me permission to stay in his bedroom for the time being, and I took the liberty of calling Bill to ask his permission as well. He has been kind enough to grant it to me.” These words come with another glance at my mother. “If someone would show me to Garen’s room, I would greatly appreciate it.” Fuck Catholicism. Fuck all organized religions. This gorgeous boy with an obvious hatred for my mother is clearly the real God. I lead him wordlessly up the stairs and down the hall into Garen’s room. He pauses just inside the door, blinking down at the mess of sheet music. I clear my throat, and his eyes snap back to mine. “I guess I’ll just um… leave you to get unpacked. Or whatever,” I say. He laughs, but there’s no humor in it this time. When I reach for the doorknob again, he pushes it further shut, just out of reach. “If it’s not too much trouble, I’d rather you stayed. See, I’ve heard so much about you. I want to figure out how much of it’s true and how much of it’s a result of those three years that Garen spent getting high,” he says. “Oh,” is all I can force out. James stoops down and scoops up the sheet music, stacking it neatly on the desk. I watch him move to the bed, digging my fingernails into my palms so I won’t make him stop as he smoothes out the sheets, erasing every inch of Garen’s last minutes in this house. “See, I’ve known Garen since he was fourteen. I knew him back when he was still this scrawny, wide-eyed little virgin from Ohio, and I saw him turn into the big bad city-boy he pretends he is now. I was there the first time he got drunk, the first time he got stoned, the first time he got laid. I held his hand when his parents got divorced and it became obvious that neither one of them wanted him around. I cleaned the blood off his face when Dave beat the shit out of him. I stayed up with him when he would have bad trips. I took him to the infirmary when he found out he was moving here and put his fist through a window. I listened to him talk about you for hours, Travis. Fucking hours. So I think naturally, you can understand why I want to kill you.” “No,” I say sharply. “That part, that part I don’t get. He’s the one who left.” “He told me you were a National Merit Scholar, yet you seem oddly retarded to me,” James says. “He didn’t have a choice. His father kicked him out of the house! Did you expect him to say, ‘Oh well, that can’t deter me in the slightest, I’ll just go sleep on the sidewalk and wait for my one, true love to get off his comfy couch and come see me’? He couldn’t stay--” “But I didn’t make him leave,” I hiss. “Bill did that. Not me. I begged him to stay, I offered to go with him, but he wouldn’t let me.” “And you tried oh-so-hard to contact him, of course. I mean, back in our dorm room, that phone is just ringing off the goddamn hook! I pick up every time and I say, ‘Fuck off, honey! He doesn’t want to talk to you!’ and you plead with me to let you talk to him, you beg me to bring him back to you. And let’s not forget all the times you bothered to get up off your tight little ass and travel ninety minutes to come see us. You’re right! It was all his fault! I mean, the way he slammed the door in your face was just--” “He broke up with me and you still expect me to chase him?” I demand. James grabs the stack of music off the desk and crumples it, shaking it in my face. “Yes, goddamnit! Chase him the way he fucking chased you!” he orders. “Jesus Christ, are you really this stupid? Are you really this blind? Chase him like he chased you. Love him like he loved you. Like he loves you, Travis, because I promise you he still does. Four months can’t change that. Nothing can.” I cannot listen to this anymore. If I do, my eardrums will burst, or my brain will explode, or my heart will break over, and over, and over, like it did every night for months when he first went away. I grab the music from James’ hand and turn around. “You should set your alarm for eight. We have to leave by nine in order to get to the church early enough. The ceremony‘s at ten. Ben’s picking us up,” I say. “Ben? The travel-sized-for-your-convenience Pete-Wentz-in-training with inappropriately tight jeans, but good intentions? I’ve heard about him,” James says. “Do not even think about pretending that you know anything about my boyfriend,” I say, and I close the door behind me, not daring to look back to see if his beautiful face matches the stunned silence. Getting the last word in doesn’t help me sleep better. I spend half the night rolling over and over, and the other half pressing the heels of my hands to my eyelids, silently begging myself to just turn off my brain and sink into unconsciousness. When my alarm sounds at eight, I turn it off and head to the bathroom to examine the dark circles under my eyes. The heat of the shower helps me feel less disgusting, but it doesn’t stop me from nearly falling asleep and cutting my throat while shaving. Once I’ve put on my pre-wedding t-shirt and jeans - Mom would stab me if she even hallucinated a wrinkle in my tux - I head to the room across the hall. A voice is seeping out from under the door, so I don’t bother knocking before I push it open. James is sitting up in bed, shirtless, with his cell phone up to his ear. “You should shower and get dressed,” I say. “Just a moment, honey,” he murmurs to who I assume must be his boyfriend, and then says, “I showered last night, after you went off to pout in your room. I guess you couldn’t hear the water running over the sound of your own angst.” “I wasn’t pouting, so… never mind. Forget it. Ben’s going to be here soon, so get dressed,” I say. James lets out a laugh colder than a bucket of ice. “Oh, right, your boyfriend. Say, since I’ve got him on this here phone, wanna talk to your other boyfriend?” he asks, extending the cell phone to me. I stare at him. He stares back. The room is dead silent, and then-- “Jamie, don’t!” I can only stand being in the room for those two barely audible words from the earpiece before I bolt. I can hear James’ harsh tone behind me as I sit down hard on the top stair, but I’m not sure if it’s for me or for Garen. Garen, Garen, Garen. Garen and that beautiful, horrible voice of his, and then fuck, I remember it all over again. The songs he sang ever so quietly while we sat at the kitchen table together and did our homework, the noises he made when he came, the way his voice would hitch when he told me he loved me, like he was ripping out his heart and stuffing it into my hand every time he said it. The doorbell rings downstairs, and I cannot go answer it. Someone does, though, because a few seconds later, there are footsteps on the stairs. I refuse to look up, because I know if he sees my face, he’ll know, but apparently, I’m in luck. “You know, just now, your mom was like, ‘Oh, I’m amazed how great Travis is being about this, he’s totally an adult’ or whatever, and in my head I was like, ‘Bullshit, lady, he’s just gearing up for another temper tantrum or suicide attempt.’ And honestly? Right now, I can’t tell which it’s about to be.” “Cor, what are you doing here?” I ask. Corey shrugs. “Your loving boy toy asked me to pick you up. Said he got stuck on last-minute babysitting duty. Don’t worry, though. He promised he’ll be at the wedding. You just might not see him before then,” he says. I’m still too numb to function properly. “But Ben’s supposed to be picking us up,” I say. Corey’s eyebrows draw together, and he glances around. “Um… dude, there’s only one of you. There’s no ‘us,’” he says. I point behind me to Garen’s bedroom door. Corey freezes, but I can’t offer any more of an explanation. After too long of a pause, he passes me slowly and pauses with his hand on the door for another moment before he pushes it open. There’s another awkward pause. “Hello,” James finally says. I glance over my shoulder in time to see Corey cautiously enter the room with his hand outstretched. “Hi. Corey Copicetti. Travis’ best friend,” he says. “James Goldwyn. Garen’s best friend.” “Oh shit,” Corey says, and I can just tell that he’s looking around the room for signs that Garen is back, too. “I came alone, don’t worry. I’m here on Garen’s behalf, just to make sure he’s not forgotten.” “It’s a little late for that, maybe.” There’s another awkward pause, then the shifting of bed sheets. “Would you like to talk to him? I’ve got him on the phone, but I’ve got to get ready.” “Uh, I don’t-” “It was nice meeting you,” James says, and he appears in the doorway, pausing to give me a calculating look before he heads down the hall to the bathroom. I expect to hear Corey from within the room, expect to hear him making awkward small talk or vicious threats. But instead, he reappears in front of me and drops the phone, still-open, in my lap. “Open your mouth and talk, McCall. I promise you’ll be fine,” he says. He sits down on the step next to me and grabs my wrist in the most reassuring way he can manage without seeming gayer than I am. Slowly, I raise the phone to my ear. “Hi,” I say, when my lips are capable of movement. “Travis.” There is more agony and ecstasy in those two syllables than in any other sound on earth. “Christ, Garen,” I say. “That’s a start,” he says hoarsely. “Just please keep talking. God, I miss your voice. I miss it so much.” “Stop it,” I say softly. “I miss you, Travis. I don’t know what I was thinking when I left, I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing here. Fuck New York, I need you--” “Stop,” I say, louder this time, and he does. There’s a brief pause. “James told you. About me and Ben.” “Yeah,” Garen whispers. “Why, Travis? I don’t get it. You don’t even know Ben, let alone like him.” “Yes, I do. We started hanging out after you left, and everything was so fucking shitty for me, but he helped me. He fixed so much of it. And I… I love him.” “Don’t say that,” Garen says desperately. “Please, baby, don’t say that. Listen, I have it all figured out, okay? I can come back. And I-I can get a job, I can sell my car. I’ll get my own place. And maybe you could come too. We could live together, we could be together, just like we wanted, just like we talked about. I still love you, Travis. And I know you still love me, too.” “I don’t,” I say flatly. “I can’t. I’m with Ben now. You have to accept that. You can’t say shit like this anymore. You have to let me go.” Corey grips my wrist a little tighter, and Garen says nothing. My whole body is shaking so much, it feels like I’m convulsing. Downstairs, I can hear Bree moving in the kitchen. Down the hall, I can hear James singing indistinguishably around a toothbrush in the bathroom. I can hear every sound in the world except Garen’s voice. Eventually, he clears his throat. “Can you put James back on? Please?” he asks. “He’s in the bathroom, actually. He’s getting ready for the wedding. Do you want me to have him call you back?” I ask. The only reply is the dial tone.